1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a camera including a barrier having a function for movement thereof between the lens-barrier retracted position where the barrier is to be retracted from the front face of a photographing lens and the protection position facing the front of the aforementioned photographing lens.
2. Description of the Related Art
Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2002-72288 discloses a lens barrier unit employed in a conventional camera with a barrier having a configuration in which the face of the lens barrier and the face of the camera body form a single surface when the lens barrier is in the closed position. The aforementioned lens barrier unit has a configuration in which one end of the barrier in the sliding direction is held by a link member that is a component of a toggle mechanism, and the other end is held by a cam groove through a cam follower. With such a configuration, the barrier is moved up to the face of the camera body at the barrier closed position by actions of the aforementioned cam groove and link member so that the face of the lens barrier and the face of the camera body form a single surface. A dedicated stepping motor is employed as a driving source of the lens barrier unit.
On the other hand, with a lens barrel including a frame member connected by a bayonet mechanism disclosed in Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2003-255212, such a lens barrel allows compact design and enables driving of the lens barrel forward and backward in a sure manner. With the lens barrel, a linear-action guide member is connected to a cam frame having a structure which allows rotation thereof and forward/backward movement thereof, by the bayonet mechanism. Upon rotating and moving forward/backward the aforementioned cam frame, the aforementioned linear-action guide member is moved forward/backward in the axial direction along with the cam frame without rotation thereof.
Furthermore, Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 6-201966 discloses a flare preventing mechanism of a zoom lens barrel including a flare preventing movable shield therewithin. The movable shield is formed of a non-flexible shield. With the flare preventing mechanism, while the movable shield is moved forward/backward integrally with the moving frame (movable frame) in a certain zoom region, the movable shield is held and fixed in the other zoom region.
Furthermore, Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 10-160994 discloses a flare diaphragm unit employing a flexible flare diaphragm. With the flare diaphragm unit, in a case that the movable frame is retracted to come in contact with the flare diaphragm, the flare diaphragm changes the shape thereof to allow the movement of the movable frame.